Arnold and Newlin: Road Trip West 1965, Disneyland

Arnie and Newlin take their children to Disneyland with Leonard and Lucille and their children. The only granddaughter for Bill and Hazel is Kathy Nevis, daughter of Leonard and Lucille.

Leonard, Lucille, Andrew, and Newlin

Mark Twain riverboat

Leonard with Kathy, Lucille in pink behind them

Walter, Lucille, Larry, Kathy, Newlin, Allan, and Joel on Main Street

Lucille, Walter, Larry, Kathy, Newlin, Allan, and Joel on Main Street

Joel driving

Joel enjoys driving

Lucille and Kathy

Andrew, Newlin, Walter (in the coonskin hat), Joel, and Allan wait to board the submarine in Tomorrowland

two Mason boys, John Mason, Andrew, Newlin, Joel, and Allan on a pier off the coast of Los Angeles County

two Mason boys, John Mason, Andrew, Newlin, Joel, and Allan 

Andrew, two Mason boys, Allan, and Joel

next post  Arnold and Newlin: 1966 

previous post  Arnold and Newlin: Road Trip West 1965, Durango & Silverton

first post in Flashbacks  How the Nevis family came to California

first post in Arnold's Story  July 1943

first post in blog  Leonard's Story: May 29, 1943

Arnold and Newlin: John and Mary Mason on Dog Island 1960

John and Mary Mason visit Arnie and Newlin in Florida. They all visit Dog Island, located in the Gulf of Mexico, off Florida's panhandle), where in 1959 Arnie and Newlin had bought a lot on the island for $5000 to be able to build a beach house close to Newlin's family, and John and Mary bought an adjacent lot. Both lots had beautiful high dunes facing the Gulf and a sandy road behind them with St. George Sound beyond. To reach Dog Island one took a county-run ferry from Carrabelle, which got discontinued for a while in the 1970s. After the ferry service stopped, the family had to get there with a motor boat towed by car from Gainesville to Carrabelle.

John and Mary Mason, Dog island, Florida, circa 1960

Newlin and Arnie on Dog Island, circa 1960

Google Maps shows Dog Island and Carrabelle; the gray dot is roughly where the two lots lay

Around 1975 Arnie took out a loan to start building a house on the lot but quickly lost interest after he had a heart attack and was very fearful of being too far from a hospital emergency room.

Over the decades hurricanes flattened the dunes and eroded the Gulf side of the lots, depositing the sand on the Sound side. Newlin was able to buy back some 15 feet on the road side for another $5000 to maintain her property as a buildable lot, but by the 1990s another 50 feet lay underwater in the Gulf and she determine the property was largely worthless. Every few years the Franklin County tax collector would try to reclaim back taxes but Newlin refused to pay for valueless land. She tried to give it away to Florida State University, but they wanted her to pay the closing costs and she would not do that either. Newlin and the Masons attempted to see the two lots together as a single parcel but there were no buyers.

Oddly, the island has had the same shape on maps for over 400 years, after first being charted by the French and named Isle des Chiens (Ile des Chiens in modern French) in 1536. I guess it just shifts a bit toward or away from the mainland due to storms.

next post  Arnold and Newlin: California Nevises 1961

previous post  Arnold and Newlin: 1960 Gainesville 

first post in Flashbacks  How the Nevis family came to California

first post in Arnold's Story  July 1943

first post in blog  Leonard's Story: May 29, 1943

Arnold and Newlin: Life with Eddie 1954 part 2

In the summer of 1954 Newlin and Arnie take Eddie to the beach in Massachusetts a few times.

Another trip to the beach includes Arnie's friend from Caltech, John Mason.

Eddie and Newlin on the Caltech blanket at the beach, 1954

next post  Arnold and Newlin: Life with Eddie 1954 part 3

previous post  Arnold and Newlin: Life with Eddie 1954 part 1

first post in Flashbacks  How the Nevis family came to California

first post in Arnold's Story  July 1943

first post in blog  Leonard's Story: May 29, 1943

Arnold's Story: September 30, 1950

Arnold gets an at-home invitation for the wedding of John and Frances Mason. Arnold stayed in touch with John Mason into the 1970s. 

next post  October 1950

previous post  September 28, 1950

first post in Arnold's Story  July 1943

first post in blog  Leonard's Story: May 29, 1943

Arnold's Story: August 18, 1948 AHN

Arnold's letter to Cliff and Jean Cummings go returned to him:

next post  August 20, 1948

previous post  August 18, 1948 

first post in Arnold's Story  July 1943

first post in blog  Leonard's Story: May 29, 1943

Arnold's Story: October 10, 1947

I still have that Big T blanket. It is navy blue with yellow trim and is falling apart with holes. In Gainesville we never used it. I think because it is wool and too hot for Florida weather, or perhaps it was a bit scratchy. I had not realized it was an award though.

Mary Neves Madruga — the spelling Nevis had not been fixed when she was born in 1875 and the Portuguese spelling Neves was used then — is Arnold's oldest aunt on the Nevis side. I think that Belmede is her son, thus Bill Nevis's nephew and Arnold's first cousin.

next post  October 14, 1947

previous post  October 9, 1947

first post in Arnold's Story  July 1943

first post in blog  Leonard's Story: May 29, 1943

Arnold's Story: September 26, 1944 John Mason

Caltech classmate John Mason writes with news about other Caltech friends.

next post  September 26, 1944 MHN

previous post  September 24, 1944

first post in Arnold's Story  July 1943

first post in blog  Leonard's Story: May 29, 1943

Arnold's Story: September 17, 1944

I think the guys mentioned here are all pals from Caltech. Johnny is probably John Mason.

next post  September 18, 1944

previous post  September 13, 1944

first post in Arnold's Story  July 1943

first post in blog  Leonard's Story: May 29, 1943

Arnold's Story: March 2, 1944

Arnie must be in the Winchester Hospital in West Haven, Connecticut started in 1918 as a tuberculosis center, now the West Haven Veterans Administration Medical Center. (This hospital was established and named for William Wirt Winchester, who died of tuberculosis, by his wife Sarah Lockwood Pardee, who also acquired and built the Winchester Mystery House, cited earlier in this blog.) He may have had the mumps at this time.

next post  March 12, 1944

previous post February 12, 1944

first post in Arnold's Story  July 1943

first post in blog  Leonard's Story: May 29, 1943